Anne Butcher. Her thoughts that count.

30 Movies in 30 Days: Power Rangers

Had I seen it before: Yes! I initially saw it in theaters (Spring 2017) but haven’t re-watched in since.

What IMDb says: A group of high-school students, who are infused with unique superpowers, harness their abilities in order to save the world.

Requirements fulfilled:

– At least one movie based on a tv show

Why I picked it: One of the few requirements I still had left was the “based on a tv show” requirement. I initially thought I’d end up watching The Simpsons Movie or South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut but I’ve seen both numerous times and thought it might be nice to find something I was a little less familiar with. I remember this being a really fun two hours at the movies and it was on Amazon Prime.

What I liked about it: As someone who never really watched the tv show, I can confidently say that Power Rangers is the type of solid action movie that anyone who enjoys solid action movies will like. From what I gather, there’s enough fan service in it to please the fans (the theater was HYPED when they finally said “it’s morphin time”) but they’ve written the movie with enough good exposition that prior experience with the show is unnecessary.

One of the cool things about this particular group of characters is that they are all really interesting twists on classic high school archetypes. Yes, there’s a jock character, but he’s the disgraced jock who got busted stealing a mascot and cost the school their football season. There’s a popular cheerleader, except she’s not popular or a cheerleader anymore because of her bullying of other cheerleaders. There’s a nerd, but you never get the impression that this nerd is constantly feeling sorry for himself because the popular kids don’t like him. I also really love how they explicitly said that one of the Power Rangers is on the autism spectrum, yet didn’t write his entire plot arc around why it sucks to have autism. This information is presented to us in a very matter-of-fact way. It’s just “this is part of who this character is, it’s neither a positive or a negative.”

Also, kudos for not writing in a romantic subplot at all.

What I didn’t like about it: I like the movie but I can’t help but think that it’s not creative in its structure or story. Now I get that the reason people keep using the same structure is because it works, but there’s also something decidedly typical about the movie, at least in terms of its story beats. Here’s some outcasts that have no reason to associate with each other. Now they have powers. Here’s a training montage. Ok then.

Also, it was hard for me to believe that the villain NEVER got a change to find this crystal in the past 65 million years.

Will I watch it again: Maybe? It is fun, but once again, there’s a lot of fun action movies and it’s not different enough to stand out.